Thread: GNUPLOT: Plotting multiple files.

Hi there,

I was hoping someone can help me with this. I'll tell you a little about what I'm doing and then what I'm trying to do.

I've programmed a numerical simulation in C, which outputs a data file on each iteration (time step). On average I could end up with 10's of .dat files, I've used a simple naming convention "data000.dat, data001.dat and so on.

What I'm trying to do is to get GNUPLOT to create a plot of each of these .dat files . So lets say I have 200 data file, then I want to plot 200 graphs, one for each. The only thing that will change from graph to graph is the data plotted within.

Do I need to write a script to do this?

If so, does anyone know of tutorials I can use, or if anyone has any examples of how I can implement this.

I know what I'm trying to do but I'm afraid I haven't a clue how to do it :-)

Any help you can give will be much appreciated,

Wayne.

P.S. I know my last post was moved for being unclear, I'm going to refresh this page for the next hour so if you've any questions about what I'm trying to do, please don't hesitate to ask.

This will end up being moved too, since it's not C. GNUPLOT knows how to read script files, so you should just write a file that sets all your parameters and then has a bunch of set output and plot commands. If you want, you can have your C file write out the script file too (when it writes out a data file, have it write the filename to the script file in the proper way).

I had a search last week but with no look, I'll try find a gnuplot specific forum. Thanks for your help though.

All the best,

Wayne.

I seen these also last week, I PM'd them to see exactly what they did but to no avail I'm afraid. The thing is that simulations like this go on all over the world but sadly no-one documents how the visualization is done.

tabstop I liked your idea about just outputing the name of the files into a ready made script from inside the c program.

Do you know how I would go about inputting text onto a certain position in that script file?

If not no worries.

Thanks again.

I've done similar things as this (assuming gpfile is my FILE* to the script and currfile is the
filename that I'm currently writing:

Code:

fprintf(gpfile, "set terminal gif\n set xr [0,5]\n"); /* whatever your parameters are; done once */
.
.
.
fprintf(gpfile, "set output '%s.gif'\nplot '%s'\n"), currfile, currfile) /*after processing each file*/

Usually I don't have an extension in my currfile (it's just data001, for example), so I don't get double-extension filenames, but if you're on a *nix that probably won't matter. (It might not matter on a Windows box either, I don't think I've tried.) Then you can just do "gnuplot gpfile", which might take a while.